Jen Miller

I grew up with my dad reading the stories of Robert Heinlein to me and my brothers, and novels like Citizen of the Galaxy and Have Spacesuit, Will Travel are now inextricably linked with my memories of family and childhood.  My favorite Heinlein juvenile was The Star Beast, because my dad would read Lummox's dialogue in a high-pitched voice, to much hilarity. All of this is a long way of saying that I have a soft spot in my heart for this type of science fiction, and as a result, it continues to be something I really enjoy reading.

Because of this, I was thrilled when I came across the work of John Scalzi--I loved his novel Old Man's War, and the way he retold his novel The Last Colony through the eyes of another character in Zoe's Tale was an exciting way to introduce multiple voices into the same story.  It was this work with The Last Colony and Zoe's Tale that makes John Scalzi the perfect man to write Fuzzy Nation--a novel that not only is itself a retelling of H. Beam Piper's classic novel Little Fuzzy, but that also at its very heart deals with the issue of providing people of all kinds with a way to find their voices.

The Turkish Delight that Edmund sells out his siblings for in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe is quite possibly one of the most famous specific food-related moments in fantasy and science fiction.  Growing up, I thought it seemed like the world's most wonderful food, and just like Edmund, I would have done a lot just to get a taste.

Then, when I was in grad school, I had the chance to try some at an end-of-semester party in one of my classes.  It was a huge disappointment.  I think I had been imagining something like baklava (which, incidentally, I would betray almost anyone for), and it ended up being this weird, tasteless, candied jelly that was covered in dry powdered sugar.  Not awesome.  Maybe I just got a bad batch, but my dreams of a fantastic food worth turning evil to get were totally shattered.

Fortunately for me, fantasy and science fiction fans seem to be a culinarily creative bunch, and with a bit of looking, I've found quite a few food-related products with a fantasy/scifi theme...

We're really excited about what's coming up this week, since we have quite a few new voices to add to the conversation here at Fantasy Matters.  Ken Schneyer, Madeline Barnicle, Nancy Hightower, Elizabeth Simons, and Ed Upton will all be contributing their thoughts and ideas this week, and we'd like to give them a hearty welcome!

Happy Friday everyone!  If you haven't voted in Adam's poll about what he should read next, you should take a minute to do that before your weekend starts--I would encourage you to vote for Scalzi's book, but that would be such a tacky attempt to rig the poll that I better not do it....We will be announcing the winner on Monday, so get your votes in before then!

Also, special thanks go to Kat Howard, Aaron Miller, and forum contributor srussell for their great suggestions for this week's fun links:

A few weeks ago, I was browsing the Scifi/Fantasy section of my local library, looking for things to read, and I came across a copy of Audrey Niffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife.  I had wanted to read it when it first came out in 2003, but never had the patience to wait in line for it at the library, so I forgot about it.  This time, though, I checked it out--and spent the next few days engrossed in a very thought-provoking novel.

When I got to the end, though, my lingering thought was: "I'm not sure it counts as fantasy."